Kissing In Cars

3

One of the most annoying tasks about owning my own business is coming to pick up the fresh ingredients whenever I'm low between a shipment. This past week it seems everybody has been interested in lemon desserts, something I couldn't have guessed, so here I am at the market trying to pick up only the best lemons available which is proving to be a struggle. Some lemons are rougher than sandpaper itself, some feel like they just have water in them and others are just plain ugly. 

As I reach for a very beautiful lemon I accidentally knock several of them on the ground behind me. I turn to grab the fallen ones, but before I can bend down I see a hand reaching out to me with some of my fallen lemons in them.

"You dropped these." 

My eyes lift from the lemons outstretched and look into the face of Tony. I knew that never seeing him again was too much to ask for, I just didn't expect to have to see him again two days later.

"Oh," I say in surprise. "Thanks." I make sure I grab the lemons carefully as to not touch his hand by accident. 

"Still clumsy I see." he remarks with a smile.

"Yeah, well, you can't control fruit." 

"Sure, blame the fruit." he says grinning. 

He used to love teasing me about how clumsy I've always been. Somedays he would come home to our place and there would be things on the floor and my only response to it was that I had been having a clumsy day and if I tried to pick the stuff up I'd probably just drop it again. He used to love it even though it meant picking the things up for me.

"What're you making with all these lemons?" he asks, gesturing to the 15 or so I have in my basket.

"It's apparently lemon week at the bakery. Everyone keeps asking for lemon desserts and I don't get my fruit shipment in until Tuesday, so its emergency lemon shopping day for me." I say, surprised as how much I told him. My goal was to keep the conversation short, but I guess I'm used to talking to Tony so much and so openly.

"Could've always used limes instead, they're close enough." he says.

I stare at him for a second with my mouth agape. "No, they are not. This is why you're a terrible baker."

"Well, I'll have you know that I told everyone that I made the cake that I got from you and they believed me."

I raise an eyebrow at him, not believing it. "Really?"

He grins. "No. No, they didn't believe me at all. They knew it was yours right away."

"I figured."

I wonder again who was there and what the cake was for. It didn't have any writing on it so there's no clues at all. 

Almost like he's reading my mind, Tony explains it. "It was a family thing. My cousin ordered the cake, she asked me to pick it up for her daughter's birthday."

I nod my head as if this news is nothing to me, then turn my attention back to lemon hunting. "I hope it was a great time."

"It was." he says as he joins me in looking at lemons. "Its nice to be back home again."

"How, uh, how long are you back for?" Please God let it be short.

"A long time. No talk of tour for at least two years."

"That is a long time." He hands me a fairly nice-looking lemon. I accept it and add it to my basket. 

"Yeah, I'm pretty happy about it."

"Your mom must be happy too." I say. He's always been a mamas boy at heart, its one of the first things I actually loved about him. His gentleness with his family and especially his mom is something I had never experience with anyone I dated before.

"She talks about you still." he says, handing me another lemon. Where is he finding all these nice ones? "She says she sees you around often."

"I only need one more." I say referring to the lemons. "And yeah, I see her pretty much every other day. We still get along great."

"Oh, I know." he says smiling. "I think she told my cousin to get me to pick up the cake on purpose so I'd see you."

I can't help but laugh knowing that that's probably exactly what happened knowing how his mom is. She's been a schemer since birth.

"God, I love that woman." I say. I pick up my final lemon and add it to my basket. Truthfully, I think I spent a little more time searching for the lemons than I needed, but I don't want to full admit that to myself. 

"How're your parents?" Tony asks, his eyes now on me again.

"Good as always. I'm going out there for Christmas like usual." I say. My parents still live in Ohio where I was born and raised. Its only when I went to university that I moved out to San Diego where I met Tony. I try and go back at least twice a year to see my parents, but no matter what Christmas day I'm there with them.

"That'll be nice to see them again." Tony says. "I gotta head off, I was sent here to get eggs, mom'll get worried and think I've been kidnapped."

"She's probably called the police already." I joke.

I expect him to laugh but when I look at him he's looking down at the lemons with a weird expression on his face. He looks up at me and blushes a little when he sees me looking at him.

"This is going to sound lame," he starts. "But you know its my birthday next week and my mom, after I told her I ran into you, wanted me to ask if you want to come to the house for celebrations."

I swallow hard feeling a bit stuck. It feels nice that Tony's mom still considers me part of the family and wants me to come over, but I'm also trying to keep my distance from Tony. This is only the second time I've seen him in six years, do I really want to go over and celebrate his birthday with his entire family?

"Think about it." Tony says seeing my hesitation. "Its on Saturday, 2pm. Its at my moms house, not mine, you know the address."

I nod at him. "Yeah, I'll think about it."

He looks down at his front jean pocket, pulling out his ringing phone. On the screen I can see that his mom is calling him, no doubt to ask him whats taking so long.

"Better get that." I say with a knowing smile.

He rolls his eyes and waves bye to me, but as he answers the phone I can hear the smile in his voice.